Chapter Text
Chapter 1
An unexpected awakening
When Jun Wu ascended, there were already other gods! When Xie Lian ascended, Jun Wu was already the emperor of heaven and when Jun Wu fell, with him went the stories and secrets of far more remote times than the present heavenly court had ever heard of. Chasing Xie Lian was not Jun Wu’s only crime, but how could they imagine it? Gods appeared and disappeared all the time, time passed, their stories were lost, that was the heavenly rhythm.
However, not every secret remains hidden forever.
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A new mission had been assigned to the palaces of Nan Yang and Xuan Zhen, strange riots, energy flows appeared and disappeared like waves in the territory of the southwestern god and although Mu Qing considered himself fully capable of dealing with it, were new times, Feng Xin was your friend and your help was accepted willingly.
The territory of the southwest was wide, working as a team, both gods and their subordinates could travel as far as possible in search of those pulses of spiritual energy.
Mu Qing walked a very dense stretch of forest being closely followed by Feng Xin, they had felt the energy flow in that direction.
"Mu Qing, I have a bad feeling." Nan Yang says, whereas wave after wave of that energy came to them.
"Whatever it is, we can’t back down now." Mu Qing also felt strange about it, that energy was not as dense as that of Hua Cheng, the energy of the most powerful calamity on the earth, but it was also not pure as a celestial being. This energy exuded fury, despair and madness, if it were not for its abnormal intensity, he would bet that it was an unlucky grower with Qi deviation.
Feng Xin can not ignore the cold sweat dripping down his back, since Jun Wu, he had not felt such an oppressive presence.
The flow intensified and then another wave hit them, so much stronger, and both were thrown back a few meters.
They could barely stand, although they recovered as quickly as they could, while warning their subordinates, by the communication matrix, that they should not go in that direction, for whatever had arisen, will kill them before they knew it. With weapons in hand, both gods prepared to fight, protect or flee.
"Where is it?" Mu Qing asked as he looked in all directions, smoke rose, while small pieces of rock fell from the sky.
Nan Yang accompanied him, looking around, but feeling even more distressed than he was. Feng Xin, since the fight on Mount Tonglu had developed the habit of protecting Mu Qing’s rear when they went on a mission, a habit he judged as natural, after all, once bodyguard, always bodyguard.
The southeastern god would cut out his own tongue, before assuming that see Mu Qing almost die in the lava flow and then allow himself to sink with parts of the bridge to the sky, only for Xie Lian to go in search of Hua Cheng, had frightened him, or rather, terrified, so that wherever Mu Qing went with him, Feng Xin would protect him, but this time, his actions were so explicit that Mu Qing could not help but notice and feel slightly uncomfortable.
"What is it?" Mu Qing asked when feeling Feng Xin so close, but there was no answer, the silence forcing him to turn in the direction of the other god to come across his frown and gaze fixed to the right of both, Mu Qing followed her gaze and came upon a shadow that walked towards both of them in the midst of smoke, she was too close, and Mu Qing had not noticed. "Ohh, fuck!”
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"Run away!" the southeastern god shouted. "Fucking Mu Qing, run away while there's was time".
"I don’t know if you noticed, you stupid bastard, but leaving you here is not an option" Xuan Zhen looked anxiously in all directions. "How did she manage to hit you so fast? Can you move?"
"I do not know, but she hit" Feng Xin shouted furious "if you stay to help me, we both die here, she blocked my meridians, my spiritual energy can not flow and heal my wounds... I am a god, and yet she struck me, broke my arm and blocked my power like those damn Jun Wu handcuffs."
Mu Qing was angry and apprehensive, since the fall of Jun Wu he did not feel this way, like a cornered rat, not knowing exactly what to do and feeling that maybe that was his last fight.
Another energy flow emerged from the smoke, and Mu Qing hardly had time to grab Feng Xin and jump away.
"Jun Wu... Jun Wu... you are gods of that damned Jun Wu". The woman said as she walked towards the two. "Worms, worms of Jun Wu, you must be eliminated, YOU MUST DISAPPEAR, DISAPPEAR"
Jun Wu! Apparently, there was another problem left behind by the ancient Celestial Emperor. The mention of his name seemed to incite the woman’s fury. Their attacks became more aggressive, though no more accurate than before, not that it made a difference, there was so much force there that even if it did not reach the gods, it was still enough to make it difficult for them to stand.
"Why should we disappear? Why does Jun Wu matter?" Mu Qing asked, while his mind worked frantically trying to understand that situation. "If we are gods of his reign, why is this important to you?"
The strange woman stopped moving and looked at the southwest god. Mu Qing’s question was exploratory, there was no intention to provoke, but when his objectivity was understood in this way?
"Holy shit! You had to ask like that?" Feng Xin complained behind him, feeling the energy suffer another disturbance.
Jun Wu... That was the error of the gods, that was the name they should not have pronounced, for the aggressiveness of the woman only increased.
"ANYONE WHO LIVES UNDER HIS REIGN" she cried "MUST DIE"
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A beam of light passed across the sky, heading towards the Hall of Meeting of the Gods, followed by a rumble that shook the heavenly city, frightening the gods. It was completely different from any rumble they had ever felt, the ground shook, as if something had been hurled with enough force to be mistaken for an ascension.
The meeting of the martial gods was interrupted when a junior official from Pei Ming, who was waiting for his general outside, stormed the hall.
"General Ming Guang..." he shouted, and Pei Ming soon abandoned his post because there was fear in that official’s eyes.
"What’s going on?" Pei Ming asked.
"General Nan Yang Zhen Jun..." the official did not know what words to use, "he... he is... I don’t know how, but..."
Xie Lian who chaired that meeting alongside Ling Wen, soon approached concerned to hear about Feng Xin.
"What happened?"
"Oh! Crown Prince... General Nan Yang, he’s fallen out there, but the problem is he didn’t return from the human realm in the normal way, it’s like... I don't know how explain it, it just came out of the sky and hit the ground..."
"He appeared in the sky and fell?" Pei Ming asked, alarmed.
"Yes, sir, that tremor just now, it was him..."
Xie Lian did not wait for the rest of the explanation and ran out, where several gods were afflicted surrounding the southeastern god.
Feng Xin was lying on the steps leading to the Martial Hall, his arm was broken, there were wounds all over his body and the remains of a talisman burned in his chest, but the scariest thing for Xie Lian was to notice that Feng Xin looked in a trance.
His eyes were wide open, moving in various directions. Xie Lian called him many times, but nothing came out of his lips, only his pupil reacted, increasing and diminishing, reacting, moving, but not to the calls of the Crown Prince, it was as if he was watching something.
"What’s going on?" Ling Wen asks as he approaches. "Only General Nan Yang has returned?"
The surrounding officials just waved with brief movements, without taking their eyes off Feng Xin. Ling Wen tried to contact Mu Qing, but there was no answer, the communication matrix did not work.
And then other beams of light began to cross the sky of the celestial city, where the subordinates of Mu Qing and Feng Xin returning. A brief noise came from Feng Xin, calling everyone’s attention, his pupils dilate even more and soon the southeastern god seemed to make a lot of effort to react, although his eyes did not change.
"Gege" Xie Lian heard Hua Cheng call in his matrix. "I feel something strange in the mortal world, is it okay with you?"
"San Lang, I’m fine, but..." The crown prince then remembered the time, through him, Hua Cheng was able to communicate with other gods. "San Lang, I need your help!" Maybe he could contact Mu Qing, or connect with Feng Xin.”
"Whatever Gege desires!"
It was not news to anyone that calamity did not care at all about what happened to the heavenly kingdom, as long as its Gege was well, the rest could explode that it would even help, but even for him that vision was a surprise. Apart from Xie Lian and Pei Ming, no other god dared to get too close to Feng Xin’s body, he was alive, his chest went up and down faster than recommended.
"San Lang" muttered the Crown Prince after the arrival of the calamity. "San Lang can see what Feng Xin is seeing?"
"I’ll try, that’s a little different from the communication matrix."
Hua Cheng looked at the southeastern god with attention and stretched his hand lightly between his eyebrows. A battlefield arose in his mind, Mu Qing was fiercely fighting a woman, and she was out of control, not all of her movements had coordination, but they had an enormous force, something that even Hua Cheng had not felt in 800 years.
However, the surprise was to note that whatever that woman was, she was forcing Feng Xin to watch that fight, without being able to participate, without being able to help Mu Qing in anything. The battlefield became more and more violent, and Mu Qing tried to protect himself as he gradually tried to activate each transport matrix that was designed on each talisman that each of his subordinates carried.
Hua Cheng frowned and looked at Xie Lian, for the first time the Crown Prince saw discomfort in her husband’s eyes.
"So?" Xie Lian was anxious to question.
"Mu Qing is fighting a woman while activating small shipping matrices to return subordinates to the heavenly city, and if my guess is right, he did it with Feng Xin first." The ghost King sighed. "I don’t know exactly what that woman is, but she’s making Feng Xin watch the fight from a distance.", concluded the ghost king, feeling restless.
Under his touch, Hua Cheng felt Feng Xin move, at least his face moved, there was fear and tears in the eyes of the great Nan Yang. Xie Lian noticed startled when the first tear flowed, followed by another, and then a silent cry began as her breathing accelerated. Nan Yang, the great Nan Yang, wept desperately, struggling to move, but each move only made his wounds bleed more rather than heal.
"San Lang..." Xie Lian muttered out of concern, and Hua Cheng hated that look.
The calamity touched Feng Xin again, feeling the strange energy flowing through his body until he was taken to the battlefield again. Mu Qing was exhausted, kneeling before this woman. Activating a single normal transport matrix consumed a lot of energy and although the talismans he had created, if used with a few people, did not consume much energy, he had activated more than 20 of them, in addition to which, he used to send Feng Xin back to the celestial city.
"What is your name?" The woman asked, "I want to know the name of everyone who lives under Jun Wu’s protection".
But Mu Qing did not answer, after all, there, feeling that he would die, what importance did it have? Your torn clothes leaving your whole back exposed, your own saber crossing your chest. Present, past, future, time had no more importance, he would die, his soul would disappear forever, his name would be forgotten, another god would replace it. Maybe Feng Xin took care of both sides now, becoming the god of the south. Ah, at this point, he would like that.
"What’s your name?" the woman asked again.
"My name is not important!" he said in a tone sufficient for the woman to hear him.
When did the great Xuan Zhen become so resilient? Coughing blood, feeling the saber move together, Mu Qing felt suffocated with thick blood in his throat.
"I’m ready," he thought.
Compared to the eight hundred years, those three years since the fall of Jun Wu were a short time, Mu Qing knew, three years being friends with Xie Lian, three years being friends with Feng Xin. After 800 years, he could say that he felt happy, he felt he had friends, that he was not alone, in those three years, he did not need to resort to old teasing just to get the attention of an old acquaintance. Mu Qing this time felt it was different from that time on Mount Tonglu, now he felt no fear, there was sadness, for there were things he still wished he had done, things he wished he had said.
With difficulty, Mu Qing breathed deeply, feeling choked and holding up his head as if challenging the woman, threw to her his coldest look.
"Xie Lian, Feng Xin... Thank you for accepting me as your friend, these three years, were the best in all these centuries..."
Another cough...
“Xie Lian, I hope that bastard Hua Cheng never goes away, is happy as you deserve to be…”
Being pulled from his thoughts by the voice so full of fury directed to the firmness of his gaze, Mu Qing felt his body oscillate between pain and loss of consciousness as that woman’s voice was lost in her ears.
"This important to me, but if you do not want to tell me, at least I will give you the mercy that Jun Wu did not give me and my sister, a quick death".
A sword of pure spiritual energy emerged in her hand, so intense that its glow impaired Hua Cheng’s vision of the battle, and then in a simple and brief motion the sword came down.
Feng Xin who forced himself increasingly to move, let loose low growls from his lips, the general so accustomed to taking the initiative of impulsive force, was watching the fall of his greatest rival and best friend. With a strangulated noise, his pupil dilated and then retracted, as if a shock had struck him.
Hua Cheng pulled away quickly with the breaking of the connection, pushed by the force of that energy that disconnected from Nan Yang’s body, while Feng Xin finally moved.
"San Lang!" Xie Lian ran close to her husband, kneeling beside him. "San Lang, are you okay? And Feng..."
His question was cut in half when the southeastern god sat in a single movement, vomit and blood coming out of his mouth, eyes cloudy and unfocused while his body in shock was shaking violently, as if he could no longer control his own movements, Feng Xin was completely disturbed.
Vomit, cough, tears, he wanted to scream, but his throat burned. He wanted to get up and go there, but his body did not obey.
Your reaction frightened the other gods, after all, how much they have not seen, in their immortality or even before it? They were martial gods, generals, fought wars, saved and took lives, Nan Yang’s despair, only fed the fear of the officials and the murmurs asking what happened and if General Xuan Zhen was well.
Xie Lian approached Feng Xin to try to help him calm down by laying his hands on his back, he felt the tremors pass from the body of the southeastern god to his, increasing the agony in his heart, his anxiety to know what Feng Xin and Hua Cheng had seen, to find out where Mu Qing was.
Feng Xin trembled in the arms of the Crown Prince, his pain, the tears, the hiccups caught in the sore throat, all that was causing him to panic, Xie Lian never saw Feng Xin like that, nor when Xian Le fell and his family was gone. In the midst of the sobbing that echoed through the air, Xie Lian began to transfer spiritual energy to calm and heal Feng Xin.
"Watch out Gege!" Hua Cheng said attracting everyone’s attention. "His meridians are closed, do it calmly, so the meridians don’t open too fast, it would be painful."
"San Lang?" The crown prince was surprised by Hua Cheng’s warning and carefully made enough energy flow until Feng Xin lost consciousness.
"Ling Wen" Xie Lian called.
"Your Highness?"
"We’re going to need a medicine god," Xie Lian replied, holding his friend in her arms. "Just transferring power won’t be enough to help him".